Iran successfully launches first military satellite

Members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps march during the annual military parade in Tehran, Iran. [STRINGER/AFP/Getty Images]

Iran has successfully launched its first military satellite into space, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced in a statement.

The IRGC, which was established after 1979 to defend the revolution, revealed that the Noor 1 (Light 1) military satellite was launched aboard the Ghased satellite carrier.

The satellite was launched from the country’s central desert.

The IRGC described the launch as “a great achievement” and a new development for Iran in the aerospace field.

In the past years, Iran conducted a number of failed attempts at launching satellites into space, the latest of which was in February when the Zafar 1 satellite was launched but could not arrive at its orbit because it failed to reach the required speed.

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